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Tenant group claims landlord exodus will improve renting but fails to mention impact on tenants
12:01 AM, 19th February 2025, 1 year ago
49
A tenant organisation claims landlords selling up is a good thing, despite the fact that it is fuelling the housing crisis and leaving tenants with nowhere to live.
A piece on the left-wing news website Left Foot Forward by Tom Darling, director of the Renters’ Reform Coalition, claims a landlord exodus would create a “more professional renting system”.
However, despite his claims, he does not provide any statistics on how many tenants would be affected by landlords selling their properties.
Claims private renters face worst quality homes
Mr Darling claims: “The idea that less supply of rented homes is bad has an intuitive power. It fits neatly with most people’s understanding of supply and demand.
“But the important thing to understand is that the rental market isn’t like other markets – it is part of a housing system that includes other tenures like owner occupiers and social housing.
“There are more than twice as many households renting in England as in 2000, yet despite the expansion in ‘supply’ of rented homes, rental affordability is the worst it’s ever been, with nearly two thirds of working renters struggling to afford their rent, and record homelessness, driven as well by section 21 evictions.
“Meanwhile, all the ‘investment’ we have seen from buy-to-let landlords has not significantly improved the quality of rented homes either.
“Renters face far worse quality homes than owners or social renters, with about one in 10 living in homes with a category 1 hazard, which pose the most serious risks to human health.”
Mr Darling fails to mention the English Housing Survey, which reveals the majority of renters (77%) ended their last tenancy because they wanted to move NOT because of eviction.
The English Housing survey also reveals that private tenants are happier with their homes than social tenants, with 82% of private renters saying they’re satisfied, compared to 74% of social renters.
Landlords threatening to sell
Mr Darling continues: “Would it be so bad if the private rented sector wasn’t so big? Consider, for a moment, that landlords did follow through on their threats to sell up.
“These homes are bricks and mortar. They don’t vanish when sold. Some houses would be bought by landlords (possibly larger and more professional landlords willing to comply with government regulations); others would be bought by first-time buyers, particularly if enough landlords sold to push house prices down – resulting in large numbers of people swapping renting for home ownership.
“More homes could – and should – be bought by councils and housing associations to provide desperately needed social housing, bringing down council waiting lists and costs and providing people with a secure home.”
Mr Darling does not mention that corporate landlords tend to charge much higher rents than buy-to-let landlords.
Many students tend to stay in privately rented accommodation as it is much cheaper than purpose-built student accommodation (PBSA).
According to Save the Student’s National Accommodation Survey 2025, the average monthly rent is £532 compared to £615 for student halls.
No statistics to back up claims
Mr Darling continues to claim: “In short, a reduction in the number of landlords could be an opportunity for many of the people currently trapped in private renting to escape – and to help create a better regulated, more professional renting system.
“And by the way, that’s not to say this will actually happen. Despite the endless supposition that a landlords exodus is underway, and has been underway for some time, the size of the private rented sector has remained relatively consistent in recent years – statistics suggest it has even grown slightly.”
Mr Darling failed to provide any statistics to back up his claims. Numerous articles on Property118 have proved this is not the case with government figures revealing that a third of landlords (31%) intend to sell their rental properties within the next two years, up from 22% previously.
However, only 7% plan to provide new rental homes, down from 11% in 2021.
In Scotland, more than 22,000 homes have been lost from the private rented sector due to government rhetoric and rent controls.
Mr Darling’s full article can be read here.
Tags:
English Housing Survey, landlord exodus, Landlord rights, private landlords vs corporate landlords, Private Rented Sector, rental affordability, Rental market crisis, renters reform coalition, Section 21 Abolition, Tenant rights, UK Housing Crisis
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Member Since December 2023 - Comments: 26
8:55 AM, 25th February 2025, About 1 year ago
Reply to the comment left by Beaver at 24/02/2025 – 14:21
It also like in my area of London. Knocks out a community of the next generation. Only high earners or couples can afford these kinds of rents. Hence the closures of primary schools. Despite the high rise in build to rent.
There is the student market coming back into the area. They will not be able to stay after they graduate. However, there is the rise in development of professional shares market . Whole developments of shared living with a high rent. This again does not address middle income families.
Member Since May 2018 - Comments: 1999
10:25 AM, 25th February 2025, About 1 year ago
Reply to the comment left by Caley McKernan at 25/02/2025 – 08:55
Stopping tenants from renting any home (even if it’s a band D, E or F) just drives choice and competition out of the market and drives rents up. It’s got nothing to do with choice for tenants.
Typically small portfolio landlords who aren’t incorporated hold rents down a bit to hang onto long-term tenants and reduce the risk of void periods. By driving small portfolio landlords out the government does a lot of damage. What they should be doing is maximising available of rental properties and accommodation generally, including for example letting more than one family rent a property under the rent-a-room scheme.
If the government was GENUINELY interested in a healthy rental market that worked for landlords and tenants it wouldn’t be doing what it is doing. If the government really wanted to do something about energy efficiency and CO2 emissions it would allow all small portfolio landlords to claim rollover relief and incorporate without penalty.
The government has a ‘net zero innovation portfolio’.
https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/net-zero-innovation-portfolio
This says that it is focused on ten priority areas:
future offshore wind
nuclear advanced modular reactors (supported through the aligned Advanced Nuclear Fund)
energy storage and flexibility
bioenergy
hydrogen
homes
direct air capture and greenhouse gas removal (GGR)
advanced carbon capture, usage and storage (CCUS)
industrial fuel switching
disruptive technologies
I can’t see anything in that strategy about biodiversity and locking carbon up in soil (although the carbon-capture nonsense is in there).
So ‘homes’ are in there. Has any landlord out there managed to get anything out of this ‘net zero innovation portfolio’ to switch from using carbon-based fuels to something else, without having to drive up rents for tenants?
Member Since June 2019 - Comments: 762
2:53 PM, 25th February 2025, About 1 year ago
Reply to the comment left by Beaver at 25/02/2025 – 10:25
Not yet, hoping a compact fusion reactor will be ready to sort out my EPCs.
Seriously though the new metrics will include things like window sizes and the direction your house faces – I have no intention of bricking up windows or rotating any property. Could bring a whole new meaning to property flipping.
Member Since May 2018 - Comments: 1999
3:43 PM, 25th February 2025, About 1 year ago
Reply to the comment left by Paul Essex at 25/02/2025 – 14:53
I don’t really have a problem with an EPC assessor being allowed to take account of the fact that my house faces south if that stops me having to install CWI (because of the problems that CWI causes…damp, rotting joists, rotting roof timbers).
However, I still don’t get the point of making all landlords achieve band C and in effect making tenants pay for that.
Member Since December 2023 - Comments: 26
11:49 AM, 3rd March 2025, About 1 year ago
Reply to the comment left by Beaver at 25/02/2025 – 10:25
They again do divide and rule and blame small portfolio landlords for everything . So, that the public consent to corporate land lairds.
The public on a whole are allowing themselves to be infantile. The logic of zero carbon or net carbon is like a fairy tale. Everything we use is pretty much petroleum based. Let alone the damage to the environment for mass mineral mining. Again, it is the offenders , the big polluters who are make money out of the zero carbon/net zero dream.
We must take care of the planet but most do no longer take care of their gardens.
Member Since May 2018 - Comments: 1999
12:25 PM, 3rd March 2025, About 1 year ago
Reply to the comment left by Caley McKernan at 03/03/2025 – 11:49
If UK governments want to encourage landlords to move away from fossil fuels to encourage energy diversity and reduce our dependence upon fossil fuels I don’t really have a big problem with that. But the government isn’t honest about what this involves.
This for example says that the government policy to make landlords achieve band C could save tenants £240 per annum:
https://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/buytolet/article-14372215/Labour-make-landlords-meet-green-energy-targets-2030.html
The policy to oblige landlords to meet band C will not do this. A band C property will achieve a higher market rent than a band D property so tenants will be faced with higher rents as a consequence of the implementation of this policy. And it is very likely that they will see no saving on their electricity bills; this is because the performance/responsiveness of, for example, heat pumps will not be as good as gas; electricity is more expensive than gas; electricity is taxed more heavily than gas: So tenants will probably have to spend money on supplementary heating.
If the government really wants landlords to do this then it should allow all landlords, however small, to incorporate with the benefit of roll-over relief to enable them to offset the finance costs of investing in the shift to renewables. It should also permit the relevant capital allowances to enable those landlords committing to the long-term to offset their investments in renewables against their revenues from rent.
Member Since August 2023 - Comments: 10
10:56 AM, 7th March 2025, About 1 year ago
The author has made a simple two silly mistakes. One, that the number of individuals looking to buy/rent are constant. He has not factored in that this number is rising every year faster than the number of properties being built. So even if every rental property were sold, there still would not be enough properties. And this shortage would continue to increase every year.
Secondly, he has omitted the fact that it is landlords who are driving the building industry because they are the ones buying many of these properties. As we know, fewer landlords are buying due to high SDLT costs, rental reforms etc. So in turn fewer and fewer properties are being sold. With high interest rates and fewer customers, the developers are not working on any large build projects. Hence shortage of properties all round.
Both caused by the weak Conservative government and now the suicidal Labour government.
Member Since February 2023 - Comments: 85
12:50 PM, 13th March 2025, About 1 year ago
Another pathetic idiot sticking his nose in. They all make me physically sick!
Member Since May 2024 - Comments: 108
1:01 PM, 13th March 2025, About 1 year ago
For a tenant with a some tens of thousands saved hoping they can buy as prices stagnate and their savings increase, I wish them all good luck. For tenants without any real savings dreaming that house prices will crumble in a puff of fairy dust, grow up. If there is no PRS, people with no savings will not be able to buy or rent.